


All This Noise

by musiclily88



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: M/M, drummer!louis, louis and liam and niall are the band, this is actually really fluffy wtf, trio band
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-31
Updated: 2019-03-31
Packaged: 2019-12-29 18:12:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18299474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musiclily88/pseuds/musiclily88
Summary: Here's how it begins





	All This Noise

**Author's Note:**

  * For [YesIsAWorld](https://archiveofourown.org/users/YesIsAWorld/gifts).



> inspiration:
> 
> User YesIsAWorld and BLESS YOU SWEET SUMMER CHILD. Also these gifs, gifted to me:
> 
> https://66.media.tumblr.com/b68051ad6144421c2a9b9f53ce8da6b4/tumblr_oiusxzy4hg1rk0k2jo1_500.gif
> 
> https://66.media.tumblr.com/e326684f3d4775135696c4903a8bfade/tumblr_pjftj2o5O11rlys9po1_500.gif

Louis sighs, casually twirling his drumstick between his thumb and his forefinger. He rolls his eyes, watching as his bandmates scream and nearly lay hands on one another.

He grips his stick and slams it onto the cymbal. “Enough! You goddamn motherfuckers, enough.”

This is how it ends.

 

-

Here’s how it begins:

Louis and Niall find half a drum kit outside the back side of their high school, just a snare and two cymbals along with a bit of gear to stand them up, Niall laughing as they pile it all into his mom’s van. They were originally considering tagging the back door of the shop classroom, but Louis dives headfirst into the dumpster before they get there.

They might both be a little bit high.

 

They carry the shit into Louis’ basement, setting it up in the corner by the ratty couch Louis’ biological dad bought when Louis was two. The basement is unfinished, and the concrete and cement keep noise in about as well as anyone’s basement really can.

Niall tightens the left cymbal, shooting Louis a look. “So, we’re starting a band then?”

“Fuck yeah.”

“Dibs on guitar.”

 

Niall takes guitar while Louis fills out the rest of his drumkit, and they recruit Niall’s friend Liam to do the bass. Liam has a faux-hawk that Louis ruffles all the time, but he’s the one who finds Louis the rest of his kit, asking around on Craigslist and Facebook until he lands the full kit.

Louis kind of loves Liam.

Louis tends to express this love by abruptly jumping on Liam’s back, but that’s neither here nor there as far as Louis is concerned.

He buys his own drumsticks, making sure they feel good in his hands before purchasing them. He twirls them and whacks them and flicks them around, laughing as he does so.

At their next practice, he _tings_ the cymbal. “Boys. I think we’re gonna fucking smash this shit.”

 

The thing is, Louis is aggressive. He doesn’t always present that way, since he’s kind of lithe, but he shoves himself fiercely into everything he does.

He always has. He doesn’t know any better.

 

He watches endless Youtube videos about drumming, teaching himself the techniques solo. His sister Lottie sighs sometimes when she leaves her room, and sometimes Louis regrets giving her the room just off their practice space.

“You didn’t give me jack,” she reminds him, rolling her eyes. “Mom let me have this room because she knows I’m not going to sneak out of it. Unlike you.”

“That’s fair,” Louis agrees, snorting as she climbs out the side window. “Ten entire points!” he cries, twirling his drumstick, pretending her skirt isn’t too short.

 

Once she leaves, he practices drumming for four hours, long after he gets callouses.

Before he washes his hands, he licks blood off the web between his forefinger and thumb.

 

His mom is neither enthused or unenthused of the music thing, but she does toss a sock at his head when she comes down to do the laundry, so he thinks that’s supportive.

 

Louis’ calluses get more intense the longer he plays. He learns to swing a drumstick around casually after tortuous hours of being absolutely terrible at it.

 

Their band is fucking shit at first.

They are shit for a very, very long time, and even their listeners tell them so.

“Yeah, thanks,” Louis says, rolling his eyes at a girl who tosses a plastic cup at his face.

 

They remain shit for a long time.

 

It’s not for months that they get an actual compliment from someone listening to them, and it comes in the form of a girl buying Liam a beer.

Niall laughs loudly as he and Louis watch Liam awkwardly accept the drink, Louis twirling his drumstick all the while.

 

It’s not long after that, though, that they get good.

 

-

It’s like this:

Louis has passion and endurance, but only when motivated, given his attentional issues. Niall is mildly manic, and Liam may have an obsessional disorder. All in all, they work as a team, and it means that they practice a lot.

They probably practice way too much, considering they have schoolwork and other shit to do.

“Are the ACTs this week?” Niall asks at one point, tuning his guitar.

“Fuck if I know,” Louis replies, scratching at his collarbone with a drumstick. He lights a cigarette, sucking at it languidly.

“Yeah they—yes, they are. Haven’t you studied?” Liam says, eyes wide.

Both Niall and Louis laugh.

 

So, the thing is, Louis probably isn’t going to get into college. His geography teacher told him more than that, told him that he was basically a worthless lump, and Louis is taking it out on his drums.

He retaliates in so, so many ways.

His liver is probably the worst victim, but he also starts running, so his muscles also bear the brunt. He learned a lot from his dads.

 

He doesn’t do well on the ACT. Liam does the best of them, and Niall does fair. None of this is surprising.

 

The weekend after they get their results, they play a show at a nearby bar. They have to bring their own gear, which is a chore mostly only for Louis, because he has to lug an entire drumkit to a bar, although they do have Niall’s mom’s van.

Liam and Niall help, because they’re not shitty people, but they do laugh a bit as they watch him struggle.

They’re only human.

Louis gives them both a slap after they’re all in the van, because he’s also only human.

 

The gig goes well, because they’re _finally_ good.

 

After graduation, they sign up to perform a local festival, and that’s precisely when shit takes off.

 

“You’re really going to call your mom to ask about this contract? Really?”

“I’m barely an adult, Louis! I have no idea how to do my own laundry!” Niall crows.

Liam sighs. “We should probably all call our parents, actually.”

“Liam! Why are you trying to be reasonable right now?” Louis yells, slapping himself in the face.

“Be-because I think I am reasonable?” 

Louis kind of hates Liam.

 

They all sigh.

Then they all call their parents.

 

Contract negotiations take three weeks, and Niall bites his nails down to the quick.

 

To celebrate, they all go out partying because Liam of all people manages to score them fake IDs, and Louis meets a pretty boy named Harry.

Louis and Harry go home together, because Louis doesn’t play around.

Except, sometimes, when he does.

 

As they walk to Harry’s apartment, they periodically stop to kiss, pressing against exposed brick and stucco siding, moving along side-streets and into alleyways.

At one point, Louis teases at Harry’s collarbones with his teeth, biting down just hard enough that Harry gasps a little. He curls both hands around Louis’ hips, anchoring their bodies together. Harry huffs out a laugh. “I’m slightly ticklish, by the way,” Harry murmurs.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Louis whispers, moving to tongue at the shell of Harry’s ear.

“Oh, baby,” Harry stutters out, grinding his hips against Louis. “You are gonna be the death of me.”

 

When they start recording in earnest, Harry comes around the studio with Starbucks one day. “Holy shit, you’re like an actual rockstar.” He peers around, shoving his hair back from his face.

“That’s—an aggressive interpretation of the text, but okay,” Louis responds, accepting the cup with one hand, twirling both drumsticks in the other. The coordination is much harder than it looks, but Louis is trying very hard to impress Harry. After taking a sip of his drink, still spinning his left hand, he smiles. “You got me tea.”

The smile that Harry gives him makes his dimples pop. “Yes, I did.”

 

Promotion for their album becomes a complicated process very, very quickly. Harry takes to leaving Louis ridiculous voicemails with song lyrics about traveling. He starts with _life is a highway,_ moves to _I was born a rambling man,_ and ends with _your man on the road, he doing promo._

It’s far from a perfect system.

 

“I miss you,” Louis whispers one night, forty-five minutes into a phone conversation with Harry. He’s in his bunk in their bus, his curtain pulled shut, although he’s fairly sure that does nothing for soundproofing.

“I miss you too.”

 

They tour for eleven months.

 

Their band immediately schedules more studio time, because their contracts demand it. To be fair, none of their parents were quite versed in contract law when they originally formed the band, and they haven’t gotten much better over time, so they’re halfway fucked about half the time.

 

By the time Niall records vocals in the bathroom of their hotel at 4 a.m., they’re all at a breaking point.

 

Their management team tries bringing in new musicians and songwriters to collaborate, and some of them work.

A lot of them don’t.

 

The sleepless nights become endless, and after the third night in a row that Louis is woken up to find a percussive rhythm that works for their newest song, he feels like he wants to scream.

He stays up the rest of the night scratching out song lyrics on the hotel memo pad, and they’re all very, very angry.

 

-

“Enough!” Louis yells, halfway through their recording session five weeks later. He slams down hard on the cymbals. He immediately heads outside to smoke a cigarette, only to smoke six in a row.

Voice gone rough, he finally calls Harry.

 

At the end of the conversation, Harry sighs. “Not to be that guy, but are you asking me to be your Yoko?”

“Oh, fucking Christ, I hope I’m not as bad as all that,” Louis groans, coughing a bit.

“No,” Harry chuckles softly. “Did you know John was her third husband?”

“Okay, I’ll settle for being your third husband, but that’s my final offer.”

“Baby, I’ll take what I can get.”

 

The band goes on hiatus two months later, and Louis sleeps for fourteen hours immediately after getting home.

 

-

 

Here’s how it begins again:

They eventually play Madison Square Garden. Harry’s backstage holding their baby along with Liam’s girlfriend who’s holding their toddler, while Niall’s girlfriend is running lighting because she is infinitely more brilliant than their entire band.

Louis looks between Niall and Liam with a grin, twirling his drumstick.

“Let’s fucking do this, boys.”

**Author's Note:**

> This is deeply based on the brutal run 1D did for their first million years, and also a little bit on the fact that I got inspired by Queen because who isn't inspired by Queen.
> 
> tumblr: musiclily


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